[insert name] you’re a star!

I go back to my recent find Billy’s Booger (check out my summary in the book box) for todays blog post.

I am a firm believer in the idea that if given the chance everyone can be a star. Given the freedom to explore what interests them, given a chance to lead most will take the opportunity and shine. When they do not it is a great time to discuss perseverance but that post can be found elsewhere.

For now we are talking about letting people shine. As a teacher I think a part of my job is providing a safe place for kids to learn what they are good at or with effort could be good at. A chance to safely explore knowing that I will help them when they stumble and pick them up when they fall.

Some of us shine in math others reading, others everything. Today we read an article about how teachers tend to focus more instruction on boys, because they are rowdy we go to them for the answers to keep them busy, because they are active we tend to let them choose the games at recess or gym. Generally I think this is still the case, it is the reason, the article claimed, that boys tend to do better than girls in Science and Math (for the record I try very hard to spread out all the question asking and I believe girls are just as good at science and math as boys, also I have girls this year that kick butt in sports and academics, just to be clear)

Setting limitations, holding people back, not letting them shine has detrimental ongoing effects. The more we are told, “It is not your turn”, “This really isn’t your thing” ” This person does it better” and so on the more we believe it.

My favourite thing to see is kids finding something that they are good at, even more so finding something that they are good at that they never would have imagined. If we do not give kids the chance to shine they won’t. They will hide in the corner keeping the light low. As adults we need to help them, give them a chance to shine and see where they take it.